


The Unsolved Heart

by amoama



Category: Doctor Who, The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Community: femslashex, F/F, Gen, Immortal Wives Andy | Andromache of Scythia/Quynh | Noriko, anti-fascist content
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-05
Updated: 2020-11-05
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:34:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,890
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27398827
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/amoama/pseuds/amoama
Summary: The Doctor needs the help of some immortal warriors when dealing with some alien warriors.It's not the first time Andy has encountered the Doctor, although it might be the last.
Relationships: Andy | Andromache of Scythia & Quynh | Noriko, Andy | Andromache of Scythia (The Old Guard)/Thirteen Doctor (Doctor Who)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 14
Collections: Femslash Exchange 2020





	The Unsolved Heart

**Author's Note:**

  * For [parcequelle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/parcequelle/gifts).



> "I am so glad you are here. It helps me realize how beautiful my world is."  
> Rainer Maria Rilke
> 
> "Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps you will then gradually, without noticing it, live along some distant day into the answer."  
> Rainer Maria Rilke

Joe is cooking and the smell of garlic wafts out into the fading Andalusian sunshine. Nile and Nicky are sparring and Andy feels something close to approval watching them, something close to peace.

For too long she has been adrift. Guilt as deep as her grief consumed her after Quynh was ripped from her and she let it own her. Booker’s betrayal, Nile’s arrival, her newfound mortality; three seismic changes in a life that she supposed had seen it all. Now, at last, she feels re-energised, with a recommitment to her purpose to guide the remaining years of her life, to use and pass on her knowledge and skills. At the corner of her mind, she senses a promise of contentment, a hope that she may yet leave this world a better place than she joined it.

In the midst of her reflection, she hears a strange, groaning sound, coming from round the corner of the villa. It’s familiar, although long-buried in her memory. It sounds like a mechanical elephant lurching up from its knees. That’s not it though. Not at all.

She remembers, as if pulled from a dream, a mass of brown curls and an unseasonal scarf, wildly out of place for the era and the climate, teaching her how to play bridge on a barge on the Nile. She and Quynh, members of Cleopatra’s bodyguard, trying to return the favour by teaching this incomprehensible stranger how to wield a sword on the eve of the Battle of Actium.

She remembers, even earlier, in pin-stripe, with a mesmerising grin, a man defeating other-worldly sea monsters at the Battle of Salamis.

And there’s another memory, a pinprick in time, glimmering in the distance, of a woman frantically searching for Vinča tablets on the banks of the Mureș River, talking insensibly of pictographic scripts, and no one understanding why their counting tablets could be anything special. She remembers feeling certain, somehow, that the world was about to end and then knowing, when it didn’t, that this bright, brilliant woman was responsible.

She trusted the word, the name, ‘Doctor’, long before it was invented.

So, to Andy, that groaning sound is the sound of the Doctor departing, leaving her and Quynh, below the lighthouse at Alexandria, and on the shore of the gulf of Corinth, watching the unworldly blue box shimmer in the sunlight and then disappear from view. A sound that left them knowing that somehow they were not quite as alone in their fight as they had always believed.

The noise stops. Nile and Nicky have noticed it too and are watching her, waiting for her lead. She gestures them behind her and together they move silently round the side of the villa. Like a miracle, the kind Andy has long since stopped believing in, the blue box is there. She recognises it now. A British police box, almost as noticeable now for how old fashioned it seems, as it had once seemed outlandish and futuristic. Also noticeable is the fact it definitely wasn’t here an hour ago when she walked the perimeter of the property.

“Che diavolo...” Nicky mutters behind her.

The door opens and Andy only has a second to wonder what incarnation of the Doctor will appear before her when the box offers up four people almost all at once. Two children about Nile’s age, an older man, and the Doctor. Her Doctor, her first.

“Andromache!” The Doctor greets her effusively, “It’s so great seeing you again so soon.”

Andy blinks. Soon? By any reckoning, it has been over 2000 years since she has seen any version of the Doctor. This version? Andy thinks perhaps it’s closer to 5000 years.

“Oh, of course, it may have seemed like a while for you, probably you’ve changed, moved on, forgotten all about me?”

The Doctor is smiling, gleeful, and as unfathomably un-aged as Andy herself.

“No, Doctor,” Andy manages, “I remember you.”

“Oh, good!” The Doctor says and kisses her on the lips.

“Doctor!” One of the Doctor’s companions exclaims, maybe more than one.

“Oh, wow,” Nicky says, before calling out, “Joe, come out here, Joe, there are visitors.”

“Is that not appropriate?” the Doctor asks. “It was our thing, in, uh, let’s call it, Romania. Sorry, yes, it was a long time ago, I’m getting that!”

Andy shakes her head and grins at her, because yes, now she remembers this Doctor. More than that, she remembers that the cultural mores she is now acclimatised to were not conceivable to her when she first met the Doctor. Andy was a different woman then because it meant something different to be a woman then. Especially to be a woman without the urge or seeming ability to bear children. It hadn’t occurred to her to even try to hide her interest in the Doctor.

She looks at the Doctor now and perhaps there is something in Andy’s gaze that is familiar to the Doctor, because the Doctor blushes.

Joe rounds the corner of the villa behind her, she can sense his surprise and alertness as he positions himself at her shoulder, “Andy?”

“This is the Doctor,” Andy says, knowing Joe and Nicky will recognise the name, although it won’t help Nile. “It’s likely she needs our help for something, and she may also want to stay for dinner.”

“Dinner! Yes, perfect! Thank you very much!” The Doctor agrees, “and introductions, this is Graham, Ryan and Yaz. My friends.”

Andy introduces Joe, Nicky and Nile in return, and leads the group into the villa. Joe and Nile set the table for four more people and Joe puts some extra pasta on to boil.

The story comes out over dinner and involves several far-right protests and some alien warrior creatures infiltrating neo-Nazi nationalist groups in Europe and inciting further violence, rather more efficient and deadly violence apparently. The Doctor’s companions refer to them as ‘Bastards’.

“They might not even have realised the trouble they’re causing,” the Doctor says, “Perhaps they think they’re being friendly, but ah, people are dying and other people are getting angry.”

“More angry,” Yaz adds.

“Yes, right, and even if they are the, ah,” the Doctor hesitates.

“Scum of the earth,” Graham supplies.

“Yes, the far-right types, that is, not the warriors. They’re not ‘of the earth’ exactly, for one.”

Andy’s head hurts a bit. “So you’ve got some alien warriors infiltrating some neo-Nazi groups and killing them, and you need help putting a stop to that?”

“Yes.”

“Nicky?” Andy says.

“Doesn’t sound like it’s for us, Boss.”

“The ones that aren’t dying are learning to fight better,” the kid, Ryan, pipes up.

“Shit,” Nile says, “Just what we need.”

“Tell us more about these bastards, and why you need us to take them out?” Joe asks.

“The Bastards are a warrior race,” the Doctor explains, “They literally know no other language but combat. It’s the only way they communicate. It’s a sophisticated language honed over millennia on their own planet. We don’t know why they’re here or what they want because we can’t speak to them. The TARDIS can translate some of their movements but it can’t respond. We can’t ask it questions and none of us can pick it up. My brilliant plan though is for you, earth’s best warriors, to be our interpreters.”

“You want us to learn their language?”

“I think you probably already know the alphabet, so the TARDIS might have more of a chance of translating through you.”

“And you think we might be able to afford the risk of ‘interpreting’ more than others?” Joe says.

There’s a slightly abashed silence, before the Doctor admits, “I blame my incredibly strategic mind but yeah the not-dying would be a considerable advantage with these warriors.”

No one mentions Andy’s new-found mortality.

Instead, Nile asks, “So why are they called the Bastards?”

“The TARDIS gave them that name. It’s probably not an accurate translation.” The Doctor sounds uncomfortable about that.

“So, will you do it?” Yaz asks.

“How much do you pay?” Joe says, a twinkle in his eye.

The Doctor’s companions look affronted.

“Most people tend to think the main benefit of saving the world is that you’ve saved the world,” Graham said.

“Yeah, no,” Nile says, “If you want us to fight anti-fascist aliens, there had better be significant compensation.”

“You can take anything you want from the TARDIS’s art gallery,” the Doctor says.

“Done,” Andy gets in quickly; she and Quynh had a tour from the pin-striped Doctor after the Battle of Salamis, “Nile will choose something before we go.”

“There’s an art gallery?” Ryan marvels.

“Somewhere, by the swimming pool, I think,” the Doctor confirms.

They reconvene for mission prep in the TARDIS the next morning, Nile having lost her mind over a picture of the Doctor with Mari Gauguin. Andy, Nile, Nicky and Joe demonstrate as many techniques and combinations of combat moves as they can, to give the TARDIS more of a baseline to work with for its database, running their movements alongside its observations of the Bastards so far to try and codify their language.

When she takes a break, the Doctor joins her. Andy leans back against a fairly benign-looking console desk next to what appears to be a huge lava lamp pillar. She’s glad she has a couple of thousand years practice at looking studiedly casual to prepare for this situation.

“So,” Andy says, “How dangerous will it be?”

“Probably not that dangerous for fighters as good as you.”

“Nile’s pretty new,” Andy says, “Strong though.”

“I’m more worried about you,” the Doctor says.

“Running tests, Doctor?”

“Standard diagnostics when people come aboard the TARDIS.”

“Hmm.”

“What happened?”

“Nothing happened. When it’s your time, it’s your time. You’ve gotta respect that, right.”

“Right! Mostly. I try!” The Doctor sounds vaguely apologetic and not that convincing.

“Booker shot me, I kept bleeding.”

“Booker?”

“He’s the other one of us. He’s not around right now.”

“Right. The other one.” There’s a pause, but the Doctor doesn’t ask about Quynh. Maybe she already knows. Or, maybe she’s forgotten her. “So we have to make sure you don’t die! Easy! Perhaps you can be the back-up interpreter?”

“I’m not the back up.”

“Right, okay, well, this is your area of expertise. I leave you to do the, uh, risk assessment.”

“Sure.”

“And really this must be the only time I’ve met you and it wasn’t the eve of some battle or other, so honestly a small run in with a small group of alien warriors is not going to be a challenge.”

“How many did you say exactly?”

“Not more than 30, 40, probably. We’re trying to track them all. I don’t think they’re multiplying as such but there seems to be a bit of a network across some European capitals.”

“Right.”

She smiles at the Doctor. She’s thrilled to be here, honestly, and she loves the Doctor’s mad, miraculous ship. Even if fighting these Bastards while mortal is likely to be the most dangerous thing she’s ever done, she’s glad she got one more chance to meet the Doctor.

In the spirit of being the new Andy, she tells her, “I’m happy to see you. It’s been a long time.”

“Sorry for yesterday, for the, ahem, kissing, that wasn’t appropriate.”

“No, it’s okay.”

“Last time we met, well, that I met you, you were much more, sort of, can I say, forward.” The Doctor appears to be blushing again. Andy likes that a lot.

“I can still be pretty forward,” Andy says, turning herself to fully face the Doctor.

“I like forward, forward is good, when you know, it’s good, wanted, preferred. I often find, I prefer it.”

“I know,” Andy says, “I’ve met your wife.”

“You have?”

“Yes.” Andy gives in to her instincts and prowls towards the Doctor, backing her up against the wall of the TARDIS, just a little. The Doctor manages to look both uncomfortable and excited.

“You met River Song?”

“Mmhhmm, and Cleopatra, of course, but you know that.”

“Ah, yes, well that was mostly a misunderstanding and you know, she was a Queen.”

“And very forward.”

“Yes, that. So, um, when did you meet River? How?”

“We were in Haiti, about 200 years ago. She recruited us to free some political prisoners. And we decided it was the right thing to do... even if she did have some additional motives.”

“That does sound like River.”

“To be fair she was not exactly sure if you were married at that precise time, if I recall.”

“It was always a bit hard to keep track.” The Doctor has a soft, wistful look to her, “How was she?”

“Magisterial, ruthless, seductive, fun.”

“You got on then?”

“We did.” Perhaps too well. River was a whirlwind and Andy hadn’t been used to having her head spun.

The Doctor swallows, and squeaks out, “Good! So good to know!”

Andy leans into the Doctor, “So be as forward as you like,” she says, “I intend to be.”

With that she retreats, strategically, and goes back to sparring with Joe, for the edification of the TARDIS’s language programme. Joe is laughing at her quietly, Andy just shrugs and then slugs hard at his jaw.

The TARDIS flies them to London, rattling and spinning them in a rather alarming fashion.

“She objects to being used for non-time-related travel, I think,” the Doctor explains.

“It - she’s saving us time!” Graham points out.

They arrive just in time for a big demonstration, some Britain First, Migrants Out, Anti-Vaxer pity parade. Yaz tells them there is also a pro-immigration, anti-fascist march organised in response. Add some alien super-soldiers mixed in with the fascists and it’s all starting to sound a bit like a Marvel movie Joe made them watch once.

The Doctor hasn’t been able to articulate much of a plan – apparently it depends on several contingencies.

“We’re going to show up, introduce ourselves to the Bastards and try to stop anyone from defacing Millicent Fawcett.”

“Or killing each other,” Yaz adds.

“Yes, that, it’s just I heard bringing down statues was a thing about now and Millicent was a really good egg.”

“Yes, she was wonderful,” Nicky gushes. “What?” he says to the stares that turn to him, “Even Booker liked her.”

The TARDIS has set them down in Little Sanctuary, tucked round behind the Supreme Court. They approach Parliament Square from the west. There’s a heavy police presence and the unmistakable sound of protest chants. They can see a huge swathe of people coming down from Whitehall with signs and banners saying, ‘NAZIS, FUCK OFF’, ‘BLACK LIVES MATTER’, and ‘NO PASARAN’.

“Yeah, I think these are the good guys,” Joe says.

“This is terrible,” says the Doctor, adding, “The police have cordoned off the racists. We need to get into the other group, where the Bastards are.”

Andy pulls a hood up over her head, “Follow me.”

She takes them off round the back of Westminster Abbey and out onto Millbank so they are coming at the wannabe-Nazis’ rally from behind. The police are letting the protestors filter in and out a bit more this end and Andy finds she can walk them right into the crowd. The atmosphere is bitter and violent and there are fights breaking out at the front between the protestors and the police.

“Right,” the Doctor says, “find the Bastards.”

“How?” asks Graham, “Everyone here looks the same.”

“Yes, white and angry,” Nicky remarks.

“Andy,” the Doctor says, “Start fighting.”

Andy nods at her and taps Nile on the arm, signalling her to follow. They move through the crowd to where it’s at its densest around the statue of George V.

“You really want to do this,” Nile checks. Andy just grins at her.

“Take the first shot,” she says.

Nile does, a beautiful long-fisted jab followed by an uppercut that Andy doesn’t let her land. She neutralises Nile’s blow with a quick slice but holds herself back from following it up too viciously. She moves like she would in training, a dance, allowing Nile the time to rebalance and respond that she would never give a true opponent. Beside her, Nicky and Joe are circling each other, darting teasing jabs at each other, shouting insults at each other in a manner that she knows amounts to foreplay in their relationship. The protestors start to become interested in them, giving them some space to fight, abandoning their jeering at the police to shout on the brawling women in their midst.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, Nile is shoved aside and Andy finds herself fighting for her life at the very extremity of her capacity, forced to move faster than she has in years. Her opponent is a tall, pale, hairless person, possibly male, whose every move and strike is so beautiful she wishes desperately she could slow their fight down to really take it in. The warrior’s reach and fluidity is extraordinary, and deadly. Beside her, Nicky and Joe are now fighting together against another tall warrior.

She fights for her life and not much more, until, in an instant, something snaps into place in her brain and suddenly she understands the movements as more than just a series of exquisite attacks and blocks. She understands it as words, sentences, landing in her brain, and she knows, too, how to respond.

The Bastard’s fighting slows slightly as they start to sense they may be making themselves understood. Andy understands their movements as a stream of consciousness, existential and meandering, questioning everything about their surroundings and the blunt, meaningless violence of the fighters they’ve found themselves amongst.

_You’re the first person who has made any sense on this planet,_ the Bastard conveys, his arm chopping down across Andy’s chest in a powerful arc. _We were sent to explore, to see if these were a people we could have relations with, but they are base animals, no beauty to their fighting whatsoever. No meaning, just anger. Except you._

_I am not representative,_ Andy says. _I am communicating with you mostly thanks to alien technology._

She has no idea how this is working really, just that she knows what she wants to say and by some miracle of the TARDIS, she knows how to move her body to make her meaning clear.

“Andy,” Joe calls, “We think they’re lost.”

“Lost?” The Doctor asks.

“Something they were navigating by broke down and they seem to be asking for directions.”

“Great! Great! Tell them I’m sure that’s something we can help get sorted, if they just want to come with us away from all these idiots,” the Doctor exclaims, careless of the crowd around her objecting to her sentiments.

From there things get rather worse. The police make it to where they’re fighting and start to try and intervene. A couple of them get a bit of a beating from the Bastards for their pains and things start to look a bit out of control as the fascists pile on to the police.

“We’re making it worse,” Ryan screams.

“We need to leave.”

Andy starts furiously signalling, _follow us_ , to all the Bastards she can identify.

“Run,” Nile yells, Graham and the Doctor too. They almost have to fight their way out of the crowd but at least 14 aliens are with them. Andy hopes that’s a good thing. She takes them on a circuit through the maze of streets between Millbank and Victoria before heading back to the TARDIS. She moves fast and the police let them go easily, choosing to stay and prioritise controlling the protests.

Once there the Doctor works quickly to identify their navigation technology and even though she can’t fix it she thinks she can come up with something similar and give them enough instructions to get them home. Andy, Nile, Nicky and Joe work hard translating through their bodies, words and instructions they barely understand in a human language. Andy just lets it happen, lets herself enjoy the efficient grace of the alien warriors, learns what she can from their extraordinary fighting styles.

Because this has always been her language too, her area of expertise, by necessity, sure, but also because this is a way she loves to know and use her body, to own her power where it can never be stripped away. She thinks of how she and Quynh used to train against one another and fight alongside each other, how much they could say, just with their bodies. She sees the same in Joe and Nicky and she misses it desperately. The way she is fighting now, holding conversations with her body, it awakens that longing for Quynh yet again. She tells this alien warrior, _There was someone I used to speak to like this, someone I loved. Someone I miss._

The Bastard uses both hands to pull her into them, crushing their hands over her heart and then pushing her wildly off balance. _I know how that is_ , they tell her.

It’s strange because compared to the Battles of Actium and Salamis, this visit from the Doctor has been almost low-key. They travel with the Bastards to Athens and Budapest where some of the other alien warriors have been fighting, searching for help in all the wrong places.

“We all just want someone to talk to,” Graham says. No one disagrees. The Doctor encourages the warriors to make a quick exit. She promises to act as a diplomatic envoy should they wish to retain ties with Earth but maybe she’s also warning them that Earth is under her protection. Andy likes how that feels, how it’s felt every time she’s met the Doctor, that she’s not the only guardian on duty, that she’s not alone.

The TARDIS deposits them back in Spain and Andy feels an intense desire not to say goodbye too quickly. It’s been over 2000 years since she last saw the Doctor. She won’t be able to wait that long again. She offers them dinner.

“Why not?” the Doctor says. “That’s so nice of you and we don’t really have anywhere to be just this minute.”

They all troop into the villa and Ryan and Yaz team up with Nicky in the kitchen while Joe shows Graham photos he took of Copley’s wall, telling him some of their stories. Nile pours everybody wine and then sits herself beside Joe to listen as well.

Andy takes the Doctor’s hand and leads her away from the kitchen to the porch that looks out over the neighbouring vineyard. The Doctor drinks her wine but makes a face and puts it down.

“Me and alcohol, not the best of friends, in this body at least.”

Andy nods.

“When you met me before, that first time, how long ago was it for you?” She hasn’t thought about the Doctor’s time travel much, it feels so abstract to her.

“Not more than a year ago?” The Doctor admits.

Andy shivers at the strange truth of it. “I’m not sure who I even was then,” she says.

“You were different, but I recognised you just the same. I knew you from Salamis and Alexandria and everyone in your tribe was frightened of me, except you. You were just a bit suspicious.”

“I was intrigued.” Andy steps into the Doctor’s space.

“Yes, I liked your intrigue. You were strong, a natural leader. You listened when I asked for help.”

Andy leans in, slowly.

“Where’s Quynh?” The Doctor asks abruptly, stopping Andy in her tracks.

“Gone.” She rests her forehead on the Doctor’s shoulder for a moment before righting herself.

“What happened?”

Andy tells her, sparing all but the essential details. She would prefer it if Nicky had been here to say it for her. The Doctor’s face holds an ocean of compassion. You live this long, you know loss on an unquantifiable scale. They have that in common. Andy finds they’re holding hands. She doesn’t ask the Doctor what happened to River, although she’d like to.

“I’m going to be forward now,” she tells the Doctor. The Doctor audibly swallows, “Yes,” she says, “yes please.”

By the time they get called for dinner the Doctor is looking satisfactorily ruffled. Andy smiles as she helps the Doctor reassemble herself, pleased with her work. The Doctor smiles giddily back at her. She speaks in a sing-song tone as she greets her friends back in the kitchen.

“What are you so happy about?” Graham asks.

“A good day’s work, of course,” the Doctor tells him. “Bastards neutralised and sent home, fascists arrested for brawling and attacking the police, no wars, no imminent destruction of any planets, peace reigns, hearts are light, food is waiting!”

Yaz and Ryan look mystified and Nicky and Joe both suppress smiles and raise their eyebrows at Andy. They know her too well. Nile looks suspiciously at them all.

It’s a beautiful meal. Nicky has made Mallorquin Tumbet, or at least his approximation of it, which essentially means he’s made an aubergine lasagne. They eat it with salad, warm rolls and garlic butter.

The Doctor is alight with energy and good will, her stories getting wilder and wilder, and it’s wonderful for Andy to sit there and listen to someone with more stories than her. She can see Nile’s mind is completely blown and it makes Andy smile to think maybe this will stop Nile losing her mind about Andy’s age now.

Eventually, the sun starts to rise. Ryan and Graham are gently snoring on each other’s shoulders, much to Yaz’s amusement. Joe and Nicky are entwined on one of the sofas. Andy sits on another with the Doctor’s legs laid across her lap and Nile slouched at her other side. Again, Andy feels that unfamiliar contentment. Perhaps, soon, she’ll even start getting used to it. It would not have occurred to her to imagine the Doctor appearing again, especially in this long-forgotten form, but she’s so pleased to have had today. A goodbye of sorts, even if it’s only the fourth time they’ve met. The Doctor’s existence has soothed and reassured her at times down the years, and it does so again now.

The Doctor isn’t asleep, she’s just looking fondly at Andy and all of their friends sprawled together around the room. Andy reaches over and entwines their hands, taking this moment of connection for herself.

After a while, the Doctor says quietly, “When I met you before, by the Mureș, you were different, like I said. Wilder, of course, more impetuous maybe, but so sure of the world, sure of everything, except yourself.”

Andy nods, she knows what the Doctor is saying, “It’s almost the opposite now.”

“Yes.”

“I’m sure of these three, and of Booker, too.” And Quynh, Andy thinks, wherever she is, whatever hell she’s in.

The Doctor’s hand squeezes hers. “Love is always wise, always worth it,” she says.

Andy leans her head back against the sofa, looking over at the Doctor. However much Andy has changed, however much the Doctor has, Andy feels like she would never not be drawn in by that gleeful, adventurous spark in the Doctor’s eyes.

“Don’t leave it so long, next time,” Andy says.

“No,” says the Doctor, “I won’t.”

They leave the rest unsaid.

**  
**  
**  
**

The Doctor has an intricately woven, incredibly fragile, headdress tucked away in one of the TARDIS’s endless draws. Thank goodness for Donna’s meticulous inventory. She takes it out and puts it on. It’s missing the headband but that doesn’t matter. The TARDIS scans it, whirring and grumbling until it spits out some coordinates.

“Are you going to tell us where we’re going?” Yaz asks.

“There’s someone I think we can find, the TARDIS can pinpoint where she is, but I think we can do a bit better than 2019.” She meddles with the controls.

“I’ve just had to go for a bit of an approximation because of the effect of deep sea diving on the TARDIS’s temporal accuracy.”

Yaz and the others gape at the Doctor.

“Salt water and time, it’s a thing. But if we go back and try and stop her being drowned at all, well, we would absolutely ruin the timeline, literally anything could happen, probably about a million things, given that she’s immortal, it’s just too risky.”

It’s 1710, approximately, when the TARDIS materialises on the bed of the North Sea. The doors swing open and to everyone’s relief the air shell maintains its power and keeps them all dry. The TARDIS has got as close as it can to it’s target: folded into the sea bed, covered with rusticles and barnacles, is a monstrous iron cage.

The Doctor retrieves a huge net from the depths of the TARDIS and Ryan throws it out several times, sweeping the net through the water, until it hooks as they need it to. Then they all pull. For a long time it seems like it’s not going to work, that the cage is wedged in too well. The Doctor is just talking about getting her diving suit when something gives. Slowly, slowly, the cage edges its way towards the TARDIS, until finally they can haul it in.

They all wait, catching their breath, just looking at it.

Until, at last, there’s a huge, gulping, intake of breath and then another and then, from inside the cage, someone starts screaming.

**

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you so much to my fave, Lilithilien, for the beta.


End file.
